‘Confident of Doon making cut in Smart City race this time’

The Uttarakhand government is “confident” about Dehradun making the cut in the Centre’s Smart City race when the result comes out on June 23

The Uttarakhand government is “confident” about Dehradun making the cut in the Centre’s Smart City race when the result comes out on June 23.

The state capital’s proposal has failed at least thrice in the past. In January last year, the government’s proposal to build the Smart City at a tea garden land on Doon outskirts failed to make it to the top 20 proposals in the first phase. In May the same year, the revised proposal did not clear the ‘fast track competition’ among 23 cities under an extended phase of the first round. Doon’s proposal again failed to get selected for the third time in September.

The BJP had swept to power in Uttarakhand in March after recording a thumping victory in the assembly elections. The Trivendra Singh Rawat-led BJP government submitted the latest Smart City proposal to the Union ministry of urban development on March 31.

“We worked very hard to revamp the proposal and to remove all the shortcomings from it…we are confident that our proposal will get selected for the Smart City project this time,” urban development minister Madan Kaushik told Hindustan Times on Saturday. “The government is eagerly awaiting the results.”

At the same time, Kaushik sought to dispel any impression that the government’s hopes were banking on the same party at the Centre and the state for clinching the Smart City tag. “This competition is purely based on merit (of the proposal). We are hopeful that we’ll succeed on the basis of our project’s strength which we attempted to boost by taking suggestions from top technological institutes including IITs,” the minister told Hindustan Times.

The Centre’s flagship project aims to develop 100 self-sustained townships with well-networked infrastructure and information technology under its smart city flagship project. Its purpose is to drive economic growth and improve the quality of life of people by enabling local area development and harnessing technology especially technology that leads to Smart outcomes, according to the Union ministry of urban development.